


veil myself in black and steel

by arahir



Category: Arslan Senki | Heroic Legend of Arslan
Genre: First Time, Fluff, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-24
Updated: 2018-01-24
Packaged: 2019-03-08 19:04:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13464594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arahir/pseuds/arahir
Summary: There's blood in his hair the day the day Arslan ascends the throne.Arslan meets his gaze by half, firelight flickering against the blue. “Do you have a lover?” he asks, almost wry.“No,” Daryun answers, not meaning it to come out as the question it sounds like.Arslan goes red and meets his eyes in full. “Would you like one?” he asks, quiet and steady, eyes inescapable.





	veil myself in black and steel

**Author's Note:**

> hi i have been shipping this since 2002 please let me have this

There's blood in his hair the day the day Arslan ascends the throne.

Daryun is there beside him. It's the culmination of battles so long and beyond counting that his mind has started to lose track of the where and when and has started counting them by the grace of Arslan’s step and the height with which he carries himself. That last battle for the city is brutal and long and by the end of it they're exhausted and bled—and alive.

When they rode in, the people cheered. The Prince wears his myth like a second crown, and Daryun rode a pace beside and behind him, always, eye on the massing crowd, watching for any errant flash of metal in the morning sun. Slaves gathered on the rooftops and at the back of the crowd, craning their necks to follow his progress because they had heard his legend, too. That’s going to be the hardest part of this fight, and it hasn't even begun, Daryun thinks, watching Arslan step up to the throne.

Tomorrow, though. Everything can keep until tomorrow.

They're not undamaged. When Arslan takes off his helmet, there’s a wound on his face that Daryun wasn't there to see happen—a bruising cut along his cheek that means he lost his helmet at some point. It’s not so bad it needs tending to, and there are more important things—reports to take, proclamations to hand down. It goes for hours and only Daryun is close enough to see the weight of fatigue on his shoulders. At twenty, he wears duty well, but he's still young.

It's sunset by the time they're done—dinner taken on the fly between delegations. Arslan doesn't let his exhaustion show until the last of the crowd is gone, Narsus ferrying them out with promises of food and wine, with all the deftness of a true tactician. He must see the tightness around Arslan’s eyes, like Daryun does.

All his callers have the same question, no matter what pretty words they couch it in: they all want to know if he'll free the slaves. They want to know if he’ll free _their_ slaves. He will. Of course, he will, but not everything can be done in a day. In the end, it’s Narsus that puts a stop to the constant stream. When the grand hall is empty but for him and Daryun, servants and guards dismissed with the rest, Arslan leans his head back against the throne for a long, weary moment.

“Does it look different?” Daryun asks. The ceilings in the palace are exquisite. Even after changing hands a half dozen times, Ecbatana flourishes. The only scars of war are the scorch marks high on the wall above the main doors.

Arslan glances at him, smiling. “I thought it would look smaller, but you know, I think it's bigger than I remember?”

Daryun huffs a laugh. Arslan goes quiet for a moment before he asks quietly, “Will you attend me?” Overly formal and unfailingly polite, as always. Daryun had no plans of doing otherwise, but there's something in the way he asks it that gives it more weight.

He stands, and the setting sun casts the room and Arslan both in amber. He hasn't needed Daryun’s help getting his armor off in years, but Daryun nods and follows. The baths are marble and lamplit and wide. Alone in the steam and quiet, fully at ease for the first time in months—Arslan’s poise dissolves. He doesn’t speak, but Daryun can finally see him for what he is: young and brave and still unsure.

Daryun doesn’t let him dwell. He starts with the gauntlets and works his way in, going with care because he’s never quite been able to do otherwise with Arslan. Armor is hard to get on, but twice as bad to get off—worse, when it’s had days to settle into your skin. No one knows it like another warrior.

Limb by limb he’s revealed. He looks smaller out of armor. The men joke that the prince will never find a bride more beautiful than he is, and they're right. With age, the prince has grown in beauty and strength like a creature out of legend—but Daryun trained every inch of that muscle into him spar by spar. He's not mythic or beautiful after two hours spent chasing swords in the sun and dirt.

He winces as Daryun works the straps on his side. “Sore?” Daryun tuts. They were separated for most of that final battle, but he heard about the blow that unhorsed him and sent his helmet flying. A runner brought him word on the field and he'd felt his blood go cold and fast.

No more risks. Not now. That's why the attendants were cleared out before Arslan entered the palace. That's why Daryun is with him, now, sword still in easy reach. It reminds him of their first night in exile. when Arslan was bloodied and tired and he hadn’t cried but he’d trembled with exhaustion and terror. He'd killed his first man that day, and seen men die, and that had been the least of it.

The exhaustion is all he recognizes in Arslan from that day. That, and the blood. In addition to his hair, his left side is soiled with it.  Daryun starts at the sight, hands hovering, but Arslan gives him a tired smile. “It's not mine.”

Daryun knew, but it calms him to hear it anyway. When the last of the armor is off and laid to the side, Arslan sighs with the weariness of a man twice his age and raises a hand to his swollen cheek.

“It won't scar,” Daryun assures him, if just to see the little flicker of indignance in his blue eyes. Gieve composed a poem to Arslan’s beauty once and no one has let him forget it. Daryun turns away from his glare to remove his own armor, but a hand on his arm stops him.

“I'll get it.”

That's new. That's new, and utterly beyond both their stations. Part of him balks at the thought of the Prince lowering himself to that, but the rest of him goes still and curious. It's not his place to object, either, and he's been dreading trying to fight the stiff leather off his stiffer limbs. Arslan’s hands are nimble and deft; he makes quicker work of it than Daryun could have, and the clean air of the baths is a blessing on his skin.

Arslan lays each slick black piece beside his own armor with unnecessary care and then stands before him, eyes lowered, not speaking. The moment is laden and confusing, but then Arslan reaches out and sets the tips of his fingers against Daryun’s chest, right at the open vee at the top of his black shirt. His fingers are calloused and rough, but no more than Daryun’s.

By habit, his gaze is drawn to the faded scar on his wrist where Hermes tried to take Arslan’s sword hand. The terror of that night has never left him in full.

He takes Arslan’s wrist, holding it loosely, wondering at how much he’s survived before he realizes with a start that he’s overstepping his station. Arslan is king; Daryun should be kneeling before him, but it would shatter Arslan if he tried.

For once, Daryun can't read his thoughts, but if they're anything like his own, he's relieved—and some things have to be touched to be believed. It’s a wonder: both of them whole at the end of this, somehow. Before he has the chance to ask, Arslan pulls away toward the water.

He strips carelessly, letting his soiled clothes pile where they land—more rust than white after the fight they had. A week-long siege is unheard of for expediency, but even in ideal conditions battle doesn't allow for long baths and fresh clothes.

Arslan slides into the water with a sigh that Daryun feels in his own bones. War is what they're good at, but it takes too much. Daryun strips and follows—the water is just hot enough to sting the dozen little scrapes and bruises he didn’t have time to notice, but it soothes in equal measure. He can’t resist untying his hair and dunking his head under the water. Arslan copies him, a halo of pink rising from the blood matting his pale hair. It's still a mess; he lost his tie along with his helmet and it's had hours of fighting to tangle.

“Here—” Daryun holds out his hands in offer, and Arslan’s expression goes sheepish.

“Thank you,” he says, turning in the water so Daryun can work the knots and dirt out of his hair.

It takes minutes. He loses himself in the task—and almost misses it when Arslan goes slack in his grip, dead asleep. Daryun catches him at the last second, arm like a vice around his waist as Arslan shakes himself and blinks up at him through his dripping bangs, sheepish again.

More than exhausted, it seems. Daryun has a sudden vision of Arslan alone in the baths, slipping under the water, drowned on the night of his crowning in one of those tragic ironies that Gieve sings about and Farangis mocks.

It won’t be easier with him as king, Daryun realizes. He can’t lose this now, not when Arslan’ fought so long and hard.

“Daryun.” Arslan breaks him out of his musing, chiding. Daryun realizes he still has him in an iron grip, fastened to his chest.

Arslan’s a more than passable warrior now, a terror on the field, but it's hard to remember he's not breakable anymore. Worry is a hard habit to break; some part of him will always be dedicated to the cause.

That's what keeps him at Arslan’s back all the way to his rooms. There are more than enough guards posted to be sufficient to the task, but this is one thing he can leave to no other. The halls are quiet and the night air coming in from the city is enticing—relaxing, even.

His instinct for danger lies low and quiet, for once. They have time to breathe and rest, if just for the night. He lets himself take the moment for what it is. So many of his days have been spent with this view: Arslan’s pale hair, the careful poise of his neck and shoulders, the practiced way he’s learned to walk—so sure that he'll be followed. But with the familiar backdrop of the palace, he looks new. The fall of hair down his back is longer, his shoulders wider. If he were close enough to touch, his head would fit under Daryun's chin. He’ll never be big, but he's no longer the boy Daryun could conveniently grab around the waist and ferry from danger as whim dictated.

Still, his fingers itch to try.

Arslan senses his gaze. “There's something I need to speak with you about,” he says without turning.

Formal, again. There's something a hair off from normal. Maybe the eerie familiarity of the palace is getting to him, too, Daryun wonders.

It’s confirmed when they get to his quarters and Arslan dismisses his guards—the first solid indication that there's something off. He has half a mind to object, and more than half a mind to double his guard while he's at it, just in case, but curiosity gets the better of him.

The second they step inside the room, the air changes. Not danger, though it almost feels like it. The room is lit by a fire it doesn't need for heat, and though they're in Arslan’s old quarters, someone thought to dress it like a king’s. Carpets and silks and a bed piled with more pillows than anyone could reasonably use. Arslan goes to it and sits on the edge, facing Daryun but not quite meeting his eyes.

He’s done something wrong, Daryun realizes. That’s the only explanation.

“Your Highness—”

Arslan winces and raises a hand. “Please,” he starts, and stops, mouth half open. It's been years now since he struggled to find words, and never with Daryun. Never.

True worry rises in him at last—he has to clench his jaw shut to keep from speaking and repeating the mistake.

“I want to ask you something,” Arslan says finally, softly, “but I'm afraid you'll hate me for it.”

The concept is laughable. There's nothing that could. If Arslan forsook the kingdom and everyone in it, Daryun would be by his side. If he rode off to the desert to live a life of solitude, Daryun would join him without complaint. If he decided that peace and his people weren't worth more than conquest, Daryun would be his blade. The time for doubting and questioning is years gone; Arslan has earned his loyalty unconditionally.

And Arslan has earned his love.

“The only word of yours that could drive me away would be your order to leave.” He wouldn’t, though. Not for true, and never for long.

Arslan meets his gaze by half, firelight flickering against the blue. “Do you have a lover?” He asks, almost wry.

Of all the questions he could have, that he would even wonder that is a shock. Daryun has had many, but not for years now. No time, and no desire. It’s hard to sleep in another’s bed when the prince’s door is the only place that puts him at ease.

“No,” he answers honestly, not meaning it to come out as the question it sounds like.

Arslan goes red, and meets his eyes in full. “Would you like one?” he asks, quiet and steady, eyes bright and inescapable.

For a horrifying moment, Daryun thinks this is some elaborate scheme to trick him into a marriage, or some joke Narsus put him up to, but then the meaning hits, and hits hard, and floors him. He can’t draw his eyes from Arslan. He’s still dripping from their bath, chest bare under the open silk robe—the memory of running his fingers through that hair comes back to him and lays him low.

He stripped the armor from that body. He felt those shoulders against his chest.

His mouth opens, but words are beyond him. A drop of water slides from Arslan’s hair to his chest, and down. Daryun traces its progress with a kind of dawning horror, because the heat that flares in his gut as it disappears against the waist of Arslan’s thin pants isn’t new. He knows it like he knows war, like he knows the cadence of Arslan’s steps in a spar and the specific gravity of his name on Arslan’s tongue.

“No.” It comes out wrong—shocked like he’s some virgin bride, but it's too late to take it back. He's given himself away. The real shock of it is that Arslan would look at him and see anything worth having. Daryun is a blade, a thing of steel and leather, built for his glory. Quiet glances aren’t his domain.

But Arslan’s expression goes defiant. “Why?”

It's rare that Daryun has cause to curse the confidence Arslan’s grown into. He turns away, to the fire, as if it needs tending.

“You're not serious,” he mutters in lieu of an answer.

Arslan doesn't dignify it with a response. Daryun realizes belatedly that it was rude, and almost apologizes—but the entire conversation is rude. The implication, as if it's his place to look and want and touch.

“You have to marry one day,” Daryun says, trying to draw logic back into being as he busies himself with checking the windows and secret doors for anything amiss, ignoring the way his hand shakes. He'd ordered the room checked twice earlier, but it hardly seems like he could be overly cautious in this, and it’s better than—

“Will I? Why?” Arslan asks, watching his progress around the room with something like amusement. “No king loves their daughters and sisters more than they love war.”

Daryun pauses at that. The rare cynic in Arslan, carefully nurtured by Gieve and Narsus. The words are theirs—for a second, more horrifying moment Daryun wonders if he consulted anyone before doing this. He shakes the thought away before the blush climbing his neck can shame him

“The kingdom needs an heir.”

“A blood heir?” Arslan scoffs, shifting on the bed. “I wasn't. Hermes was, and died for it. It means nothing.”

Distantly, Daryun realizes he's losing this argument. He realizes this _is_ an argument, and a serious one. When he turns back to the bed, Arslan is perched on the edge of it like a hawk preparing for flight, watching him in the flickering light with a hunter’s gaze. The bruise and scrape across his cheekbone look worse than they did before the bath; it might scar after all.

It hits him, finally.

Arslan is battle worn and weary enough to pass out in a bath. That he's still awake and determined to have this conversation is a shock. He's not smiling now. This isn’t a joke to him, and it never was. This conversation, in the palace where they first met. He's not the timid prince anymore but conqueror and king and here, on the night of his final test passed, this is what’s important to him. He’s arguing Daryun into his bed like this is the real fight and Ecbatana the afternote. But it's not. Ecbatana and his people are precious to him beyond his own life.

As is this, somehow.

“Is there some far-off princess you've been missing?” Arslan asks when Daryun’s been too silent for too long. He sounds almost hurt. He’s preparing himself for rejection in this, as if there’s anything Daryun could deny him. As if he’s not the most beautiful thing Daryun has had the delight of seeeing.

No lost love could compare to this. He's known from the first time he was the one run to ground in a battle and Arslan the one with a sword and shield and will to protect—long enough back now that the wounds he got that day have all healed over to old scars. There was no fear in him that day, not even when his lance broke and he was weaponless in the mud, seeing what he knew would be his last: the smoke and haze of blood and sweat in his eyes, the men around him—and the prince in gold and glory, bursting through their ranks.

Daryun thought it a mercy at the time, a vision brought by death: the thing he wanted to see most of all. He'd woken up with Arslan at his bedside, gold armor still dulled with soot and a dozen worse things that Daryun knew by heart. There was blood Arslan’s face and something wild in his eyes, and Daryun had known that look by heart, too.

He shakes his head in answer, still trying to find his way to words. They’ve never been his best asset—battlefield speeches are one thing, but this is something else, and he can't afford to get it wrong. The bed is only five steps away. Not insurmountable, after all.

He kneels before it, putting Arslan at the advantage of height.

Arslan goes stock-still. This is the limit of his courage, Daryun realizes. He can fight a hundred battles and take a kingdom, make pretty words for alliances, conjure faith beyond reason, but he can't ask for this outright. He can't, because he must know Daryun would give it to him.

“You’ll regret it,” Daryun says finally, a warning to them both, looking up.

Arslan lowers his head, pale hair falling over his shoulders, longer than it was in their past. Wilder, too. It shields his eyes from the firelight, and when he speaks, his voice shakes.

“You know me better than that.”

He does.

There’s a pause while Arslan gathers his thoughts, and Daryun is grateful because he needs time to gather his own.

“If I ask you for tonight, I know you'll give it,” Arslan says. “But I don't want tonight. I want you to stay with me, _please_ —" He cuts himself off, pushing forward like the last of his self-control has snapped, and of the two of them, Daryun was sure Arslan would be the last to break. The hands in his hair are strong, almost forceful, his lips precise and desperate, like this is another battle Arslan can win on wit and determination.

There are a dozen good reasons to push him away. Daryun tries to imagine a life of this, and the reality of the situation comes crashing down around him at last. No one will come before Arslan in his life but death. Years they've been fighting together. Years they've been confiding and tending and training. Years he's been sleeping on a palette outside Arslan’s door, worrying about unlatched windows.

Arslan makes a small, pained sound and pulls away. “I’m sorry—”

Daryun hears himself laugh. Arslan’s eyes go wide at the sound. They’re already bright, but he hasn’t cried in years, and he won’t cry at this. Determination takes him, but he has to take care with this, above all things. He reaches out slowly, cupping Arslan’s face in his hands, running his thumb under the edge of the bruise below his eye.

Arslan stills at the touch, breath stalling—brave and wanting, but still scared. An army wouldn’t give him pause, and yet this does.

His hair is still damp from the baths against Daryun’s hands, warm and soft, and he lets himself indulge it for a moment. There’s something he’s been meaning to tell Arslan for years. When he first came to the palace, stripped from the life he knew, shunned by his parents, and later in their exile when he threw himself into training and study and trying—always trying, always striving, at his own expense most of all.

Daryun has no gift with words, but he tries to find the right ones. “In all the years I’ve known you, you’ve never asked me anything you wanted.” Arslan closes his eyes, pulls in a breath and exhales. Daryun is close enough to feel it against his face, to feel his throat jump under his fingers. “You’ve never asked me for anything I didn’t want to give.”

The last of his hesitation falls away. Arslan is precious beyond all else; there’s no one he would entrust this to, and the prince is never selfish. It’s easy to forget he’s human at all, with human wants and human needs. Daryun slides his hand to the back of Arslan’s head, threading his fingers in pale hair. They might never have met. Arslan might have lived out all his days in the city as some merchant’s child, or gone to battle as infantry, been slain in the first skirmish.

When you’re lucky enough to be offered something like this, you don’t shun it.

Daryun pulls him close enough to let their lips brush, but Arslan pulls away. “What do you want?” he asks. This close, his eyes are all Daryun can see, the kind of stunning blue Gieve dedicated an entire verse of his ridiculous poem to.

“You,” Daryun says, and finds it’s honest. He lets one hand slide to Arslan’s shoulder and down, grazing his ribs and the lean, battle-hewn muscle there, making his intent unmistakable. _You, happy,_ he doesn't add, but it's as true.

He keeps the kiss slow and simple, letting Arslan find his pace in it. He's inexperienced. Dalliance was never his style, and his life hasn't left room  for something more serious. Except—maybe it has, Daryun realizes, pressing a hand low on Arslan’s stomach where there's a dusting of hair, feeling the muscle there jump as he works his hand lower. Arslan is already half hard; it only takes moments to bring him full, but that’s not how he wants this.

Daryun deepens the kiss and then pulls away, keeping his eyes locked on Arslan’s face as he hooks his thumbs under the waist of his loose pants, working them down his legs. Arslan raises his hips to help, but otherwise he's unreadable in desire.

When Daryun bends his mouth to the task, Arslan cries out. It’s the first victory of the night, and it’s incredible that in this he's easy to overwhelm. He's been hunted by nations, but this is what brings him down. He loses himself in the task. He’s practiced at it, but it’s never seemed to matter so much. He lets himself pull off and lathe his tongue along the inside of Arslan’s thigh, indulging himself.

The only piece of it out of place is Arslan’s silence. When he finally looks up, the sight that greets him is a shock: Arslan, red and sheened, and while Daryun indulged, Arslan bit his way through his lip, a line of blood running down his chin.

Daryun pulls off him. “This isn't a trial,” he says, soft as he can because he's used to barking orders but never here, never like this—never with Arslan.

It'll take doing, he realizes in that moment, by the look in Arslan’s eyes. Even half-lidded and exhausted, he can't let go. It'll take practice to convince him he can have what he wants. In this one thing, Daryun has been remiss. He would give Arslan a kingdom, but there are better things found in quiet moments that he deserves as much.

He reaches up, pulling Arslan’s hand to his hair and holding it there until Arslan understands what he wants and grips tight. This time when he bends down, he takes his time and goes slow. Every little unconscious tug at his hair is a victory.

When Arslan comes, it's with a low cry almost in the shape of Daryun’s name and a full-body shudder that’s flattering even if it feels unearned. It'll take time to teach him what he can have, and maybe they'll have that now. No tents in muddy fields and weeks on horseback. They won't have an easy life, but they’ll have something.

Daryun rises and brings himself off in long, languid strokes, hovering over Arslan where he's spread out on the fine embroidered bedding like something out of a dream. Days spent in the sun and the blush of his afterglow dust his cheeks and shoulders. The whole while, Arslan watches him, intent even as he's coming down like this is some new field of war to learn and take. It's not a bad mindset to have.

He tries to make a show of it, but in the end, Arslan pulls him down for a kiss and keeps him close, and that's better. That's enough. When he comes, he buries his mouth against Arslan’s shoulder and reves in the feel of fingers against his neck, keeping him close.

A great part of him wants to stay there, face hidden in this warm, perfect thing he’s loved and tended for years beyond count. It's against custom though, for concubines and queens alike, and he's something lower, surely.

Arslan makes his decision for him, pulling his arms up and around Daryun’s waist, holding him there. “I want you to stay, if you would like to.”

There's a finality to it. Once given, Arslan’s affection is unconditional. In this, he’ll be no different. They gained a kingdom and something like peace, and as long as he can have this, Daryun will never take this for granted.

“Please,” Arslan adds, almost a whisper.

 

* * *

 

He stays.

**Author's Note:**

> Come talk to me about old ass ships on [tumblr](http://arahir.tumblr.com)!
> 
> Also if you have any requests for this particular AU, let me know. I'll ship this until I die.


End file.
